


An Important Partnership

by bleachedpink



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: F/F, Secret Samol 2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-30
Updated: 2017-12-30
Packaged: 2019-02-23 21:07:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13198587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bleachedpink/pseuds/bleachedpink
Summary: A brief summary of Tender Sky and Open Metal, from their meeting to the attack on Contrition's Figure.------------Secret Samol gift for shipyrds on twitter! Thanks so much for the prompt! I picked "Tender/Open's fraught ideological breakup" and tried to explore their relationship a bit, both in the beginning and during it, along with their relationships with the Divine Fleet.





	An Important Partnership

Open had always known Tender was special. From the moment they spotted each other at the mass bequeathing of the temple, they had a connection. They were young then, and Open had long hair, twisted into a severe braid so she wouldn’t mess it up. Tender had short, scruffy hair, her tabby cat ears poking up through it to listen to everything she could catch.

 

They didn’t see much of each other that first year, each was so busy with the beginning tasks they were given. Apprentices rarely saw each other at all, so intense were their studies. But Open kept the image of a child’s ears eagerly swiveling to take everything in, and she kept looking.

 

When they completed their training and took their names, Open and Tender were the only ones left from that bequeathing ceremony. This wasn’t unusual, they had learned in their studies, many students figured out that while they kept the faith, this is not what they truly wanted to do. For Open it was something she needed to do. She had felt it from the moment she saw a drawing of Anticipation, large and beautiful and so, so powerful. She knew that she could bring the Mirage into a new age, as surely as she knew that she was Metal.

 

Their first assignment together was in the garden of the temple, grafting branches of trees to produce a perfect amalgam of all at once. Feathered insects darted around, their soft wing beats a background to their work. For the first day, they rarely spoke, and only to ask for items they each needed. On the second day, Open saw Tender simply place a graft to a tree and simply hold it there for a moment. The tree shivered, and in an instant it was remade, blooming as vibrantly as the principle tree in the center of the grove.

 

Open barely noticed herself let out a small, surprised grunt. Tender whipped her head around, ears leading and tail stiff.

 

“How did you do that?” Open asked, feeling that the question was inadequate. Neither of them had been fitted with chips before their bequeathing, something Open was feeling acutely.

 

Tender shrugged, trying to seem casual. “Do what? This is our assignment.”

 

Open stepped closer to her, letting her arms hang at her side loosely. “I saw you change that tree, Tender Sky. How did you do it?”

 

Tender’s ears went back for a moment, and Open realized that a bit of the fervor she had been criticized for during training had leaked into her voice. But then Tender seemed to relax, perhaps recognizing that she herself had some of that fervor as well. “Let me show you. I think… I think we’re special.”

 

And Open felt herself begin to blossom in the same way that the tree had.

 

* * *

 

 

Years later, and Tender knocked at the door of Open’s workshop, doing her the courtesy of announcing herself. Her quiet demeanor was rumored to be a gift from Anticipation, taking away its name from others. Open looked up and blinked, still adjusting to seeing lavender fur instead of tortoiseshell. Her hands stilled in the display in front of her, mechanical parts fitting together like plates on a tortoise’s back.

 

Tender smiled as quietly as she had approached, and perched on a stool next to Open’s worktable. “What’s that? Testing your mettle?”

 

Open smiled back in kind at their private joke, and spun the display out to Tender, who caught it delicately. “This is Independence. Isn’t it beautiful?”

 

Tender closely examined the display, catching sight of a few pieces that looked like Open’s modifications. “Are you sure this is it? Seems like you’ve been busy.”

 

Open nodded, and caught herself grinning. “Look closer and you’ll see.”

 

Tender expanded the diagram, and as she dove deeper and deeper inside the parts she saw that like so many other parts of the Fleet, these were multipurpose. She saw the communicators to Earth, and the faces of all the leaders Open planned to engage with—to lead. And she saw the perfect machine in the design of all of this.

 

Tender recoiled on instinct, and the diagram retreated to above Open’s table, augmenting the machinery that was already there. Her ears were back again she knew, and she hated the fact that it was so hard to lie to Open, who sat there with an examining look on her face that Tender had only felt turned on herself a few times before.

 

“What is it?” Open asked, her voice for once losing some of that iron surety that was always there. If Tender hadn’t known better, she would have thought that Open was doubting.

 

Tender shook her head and tried to smile, but felt it come out weak. “It just seems like you have forgotten an important partnership in your work.” She was talking about the Fleet and its people of course, but as she said it she felt what Open would take it to mean.

 

And as Open stood up quickly and made the quick stride over to her seat, Tender knew she was right. And as Open took her hands the way she had a million times and looked her dead in the eye and began to explain how she had not forgotten them at all, how she had given them a place unlike any other, Tender Sky was quietly afraid.

 

* * *

 

 

Tender created and engineered so many environments for the good of other people that she sometimes found herself wandering through them in her dreams, unable to find a space for herself in her own creations. Those timeless people who cared for the temples on all cityships only had the best interests of the fleet at heart. But that was the problem, Tender had realized after waking up from another dream lost in her creations. They only had the best interests of the fleet in mind. There was no room for a single woman in all of that, or for two women joined together. So she convinced herself that her leaving the priesthood was voluntary—they had no reason to cast her out, did they?

 

Open followed Tender, and for a few years they lived together on Séance, Tender creating places for other people and for herself. Open applied her mechanical fervor, and became known as one of the best menders on the ship—the best creator, Tender quietly thought, as she watched Open work on her blueprints and miniatures and schematics.

 

* * *

 

 

Tender thought of Open’s schematics and her environments when she was confronted with that monstrosity of themselves in Contrition. She heard the chanting. For a moment it was lovely, and she reflexively noted it in that corner of her mind reserved for building. Then she looked up again at the reflection of her and Open and realized that it was as they had appeared when they had last seen each other.

 

Open’s head was shaven, and Tender’s hair was long and flowing, yet they were still joined.

 

For another moment Tender considered if it was possible she had been wrong, if she should have gone along with Open’s plans and helped to build a new kind of monster. Seeing the beautiful cast of rich colors and light on that monstrous form of themselves, perhaps it would have been alright. Perhaps it would have been better to tear down this society and create a new one from the rubble.

 

Their huge, dripping hands smashed down upon a building, and the moment passed. As she readied her weapon, Tender knew she had made the right decision in joining the Beloved. She also knew that she missed Open.


End file.
